Aberdeen this evening flew out to Kazakhstan for their Europa League Third Qualifying Round 1st Leg tie against Kairat Almaty. Before leaving late on Tuesday night the manager spoke to RedTV:

“We are excited about the trip. The quick turnaround of games makes us have to work that bit harder but we are looking forward to it all the same.

“It is a long journey.

“That complicates things slightly but it does not take away from the fact we are excited about the tie.

“In terms of how difficult the travelling (distance of the trip) is going to be, we don’t know yet. We are going to try and do things which will hopefully mean the players can still perform to the maximum of their ability both for this game and for the league game against Dundee United on Sunday.

“Hopefully we will get it right. I don’t think there is a perfect way of doing it with the time difference between the countries but we can’t do anything about that. It is what it is. We are trying to deal with it by flying out late on Tuesday night. We will try and get ourselves sorted out at the hotel tomorrow afternoon local time. We will then have a few hours to prepare for training on Wednesday night.

“The boys have a lot of confidence at the moment and so they should do. This will be a tough tie, there is no doubt about that. We expect that at this stage of the competition. But we should be confident. That does not give you any guarantees but we are ready for the challenge ahead of us.

“Almaty are a strong side who are well into their season. They look like a side that are well up and running and that does give them an advantage over other sides in this competition who are just starting their seasons. I think they have that in their favour.

“They have a talent at the top end of the pitch and can score goals. We know we are going to have to perform well over the two legs to qualify for the next round. I thought we did that against the Croatians. It is a tie we can win but we are going to have to play well.

“We don’t have a bundle of experience of playing at this level but I feel the players for the most part have shown a good level of maturity in terms of dealing with managing the game on the pitch and taking on board the information that we give them. I think the experience we gained last season in this competition has helped us.

“Team news is that there are a few knocks but hopefully nothing that will stop anyone from missing the game on Thursday.”